Tag Archives: The Velveteen Rabbit

Post navigation

Not that you need an excuse to tell your kids you love them, but if you’re looking for gifts more nourishing than candy, you can’t do better than a book about love for Valentine’s Day. With a nod to Carter Higgins who gave me the idea in the Design Mom blog, here’s my top five; please let me know which ones you recommend.

1. Love You Forever. (By Robert Munsch, illustrated by Sheila McGraw. Firefly Books). One of the many things I love about this book about a mother who rocks her baby all the way through adulthood is the story behind it, which author Robert Munsch shared with me in a 2004 interview. No publisher wanted this book because it wasn’t funny like his previous ones. Writing it was the only thing that helped him heal after he and his wife had two stillborn babies, he told me. As I wrote back then: “Kids get that it’s about a parent who will love them all through life. Adults understand that the parent is aging, and that one day the child will be doing the rocking.” I can’t think of another book that makes me so happy and sad at the same time.

2. Plant a Kiss (By Amy Krouse Rosenthal, illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds. HarperCollins). “It goes like this. Little Miss planted a kiss.” I have become a huge Peter H. Reynolds fan ever since I interviewed the honoree of the USA Film Festival’s KidFilm Festival in January. Here, he is the illustrator to Rosenthal’s wonderful, whimsical text about a little girl who literally plants a kiss — with a magical result. Be charmed and if you get the book, Reynolds will be back for the Dallas Museum of Art’s Arts & Letters Live March 15 — and you can ask him to sign it then.

3. Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch. (By Eileen Spinelli, illustrated by Paul Yalowitz, Simon and Schuster). When lonely, dour old Mr. Hatch gets a big valentine that says, “Somebody loves you,” it changes his life for the better. It makes him reach out and be giving and kind. Then when he finds out the valentine had actually been delivered to him by mistake, all his new friends rally to show him how much he really is loved. A beautiful message that reminds our kids and all of us to reach out and make a difference in someone’s life.

4. Junie B. Jones and the Mushy Gushy Valentime. (By Barbara Park, illustrated by Denise Brunkus. Random House). Barbara Park is another favorite interview subject. In 2008, this mother and grandmother told me how she drew on her own childhood for Junie B.’s irrepressible character (yes, she remembers getting sent to the principal for talking). In Junie B., she has created a voice that kids know and trust because Junie says anything that comes into her mind completely uncensored. So when Junie B. talks about love and mushy gushy valentimes, they will listen to what she has to say, which is generally truthful and wise (as well as funny).

5. The Velveteen Rabbit: Or How Toys Become Real (By Marjery Williams, illustrated by Charles Santore. Applesauce Press) Yes, I know I have lots of company in treasuring this 1922 story about a toy bunny that learns that the only way to become real is to love and be loved. When you think about it, isn’t that also the story of Pinocchio, the wooden boy who becomes real? Isn’t that the story of us all — we are just things, a collection of cells and mechanical parts, until we learn to love and be loved. This will always be one of my all-time favorites and I’m looking forward to checking out the new edition, with illustrations by Charles Santore, due out Feb. 19.

Or will I always prefer the original pictures by William Nicholson? Can’t yet decide…

Up until now we’ve been able to catch glimmers of how exciting it is for kids to catch shows at the AT&T Performing Arts Center, with the little ones packing the house for Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, the annual stops for Dallas Children’s Theater’s national touring shows and the Dallas Opera’s opera for kids programming.

Now it looks as if the center is making a full-fledged commitment to give the kids something to see all season long, from the national tour of the new Clifford the Big Red Dog Live! show to Enchantment Theatre Company’s The Velveteen Rabbit. Check it out: